Sunday, June 24, 2012

Figuring it Out

Sometimes it takes awhile to sort out why I get to feeling lopsided when I watch TV Nooz. Not just that it is biased. I mean, it is biased, but so what? It's the echo chamber effect that the "talking points" are there no matter where I look. This little chart is impressive for the way it makes this easy to understand why I feel beaten up some of the time.

So little of the time we watch TV should be devoted to the news. I read a lot more these days than I used to because I don't like the echo effect. The so-called minorities may soon not be, in the aggregate, minorities much longer so their lack of coverage is to say that they don't count in the national debate when, in fact, they very much do count.

On a different note I have been following the in's and out's of the Darrell Issa witch hunt/political theater. The Limbaugh twist on the "story" tries to make this about 2nd amendment rights. This charge has been taken up by the trollz on places like the Huffington Post comments. It is insanity of the first order and even pushing back to show the illogical in the conspiracy theory is combating the nickle-posters... an impossible task.

Issa demands documents that the Holder (the AG) is restricted from giving out. These doc's have names of agents (of the undercover variety) and informants in both the U.S. and Mexico as well as indications of on-going operations. They are the deliberative notes of those inside the AG's office that no AG would ever allow to go outside their office. These notes are only from AFTER the Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was shot and killed... most likely with one of the "gun-walked" guns that ATF lost track of. They (the ATF) had run this sort of operation before (under the Bush administration) and had lost track of guns before. The trollz now say that because the President invoked executive privilege it PROVES his complicity in the operation of Fast & Furious. Got the picture?? It proves nothing of the sort. No witnesses have been called from the Bush administration to date. No evidence what-so-ever has surfaced that even the head of the ATF (much less Eric Holder or the President) even knew what the rogue agents in the Phoenix ATF office were up to. Yet, it is the huge cry from the republicans that this is a plot to create a demand for further gun regulation.

On its face this is a laughable line of ill-logic but it has deflected a vast number of people from thinking or talking about the strengthening economy.

Lastly, I spent some time meandering through a junk art show in the park today. There were petition workers there trying to get signatures to put Charter Schools on the ballot. That is, pro-charter schoolers. When we said it took money away from the public schools they insisted that it did not. My freedom of speech for this particular occasion was to flip this guy off. I know, I know... it put me on his level but frankly one more lie in my day (it was nice and sunny) was a bit too far to accept.